Chapter Eleven #2
He stormed up the stage stairs and towered over her. “Did you do this?”
“Do what?” she asked with the same wide, innocent eyes Zara had given her a few minutes ago.
“Brought the plague to my entire band!” Remi threw his arms up. His hair was messy like he’d been running his hands through it, but he didn’t look like he’d been curled up in the fetal position and sick like the rest of the guys did.
“You look fine,” Zara said.
Skye nodded. He actually looked more than fine.
He was already dressed for the show, his black jeans slung dangerously low on his hips, and his torso was uncovered except for a thin black mesh, which left more than a hint of the dark ink patterns on his chest and the large colored portrait on his back.
“And actually,” Zara continued. “Plagues are pretty complicated to pull off. You have to get the Devil’s permission before using his magic for that kind of soul bargain. You know, since killing his source of souls is kinda antithetical to getting souls.”
Skye nodded again.
Remi dragged his eyes away from her to pin Zara with the same icy stare. “Who the hell are you?”
“Zara.” She fluttered her eyelashes. The red of her irises blinked in and out as she shifted to her demon vision.
Remi curled his lip. “You’re one of them.”
“If you mean another woman who is going to use her reserve of magic to fix all your problems, then yes, I am one of them,” Zara said. “Say thank you.”
“I don’t understand why you people think I’m going to be grateful when you solve a problem that you created,” Remi said through gritted teeth.
“I didn’t create this, Remi,” Skye said. “It’s the bargain—”
Remi heaved a violent sigh. “Yes, I know. Everything is the bargain’s fault.”
“Wait,” Zara said. “If Skye did this, why aren’t you sick?”
“Excellent point, Zara,” Skye said with a flourish of her hand.
Remi narrowed his eyes.
Zara continued, “What if this isn’t the bargain or demon magic? What if your bandmates have been on the road, staying up late, drinking, doing drugs, fucking random strangers, and they just got sick?”
“Oh, Remi has certainly been fucking plenty of random people,” Skye muttered under her breath.
Remi’s gaze snapped back in her direction. His piercing eyes surveyed her, and the corner of his mouth twitched. An uneasiness flitted through her, but she couldn’t place why.
“You know what?” Remi finally said. “You’re right.” He shook out his shoulders and stopped scowling. “My bad. I need to go get ready for the meet-and-greet. Since I’ll have to meet and greet everyone myself today.”
Skye scrunched up her forehead, trying to figure out what he was getting at, but he just turned and walked away.
“Zara is going to the pharmacy to get medicine,” Skye said. “And she’ll be able to use a little magic to get you guys through the show.”
“Wow,” Remi said without any inflection in his voice. “How perfectly convenient.”
“You’re welcome!” Zara said as Remi disappeared out the back door. “Devil damn me, he’s exasperating.”
“Yep.”
“I bet the sex is going to be hot.”
Skye just shook her head and kissed both of Zara’s cheeks in goodbye before resuming her task of fixing the stage. Zara sifted away to the pharmacy.
About an hour later, Skye was in the trailer of one of the trucks outside the venue, taking inventory of the stage lights that hadn’t broken, when Zara returned.
She walked from the flames with a triumphant grin.
“I’ve delivered medicine to your band, and I’ve thought of a solution to your problem.
” She situated herself on one of the rolling black equipment boxes.
“What if the bargain isn’t sticking because you need another dose of magic?
Like the magic all dissipated and you’re waiting for the cement to dry, but what if there is no cement, right? ”
Skye put her tablet down. “I redid the bargain. I felt the devil magic go into his soul.”
“But you said you were fighting with Remi at the time. He didn’t want the bargain at that point, right? Maybe his soul could sense that.”
“I’m never going to get him to agree to the bargain again.”
“Maybe you don’t have to in the same way,” Zara said, digging a lollipop out of her pocket. “Maybe he just needs to say that he wants the bargain to work or have less resistance to it. That’s why compulsion doesn’t work when making soul bargains. The soul has to want it to work.”
It made some sense. “But I already used up all the magic.”
“So if you go ask the Devil for more magic—”
Skye shook her head. “I can’t go back there, Zara. If I go to the throne room without Remi’s soul…” She snapped her pointer and middle finger together in a scissor motion.
Zara unwrapped her lollipop and sucked on it as she narrowed her eyes, thinking.
Skye picked up her tablet again to start cataloging the stage lights, but her mind was whirling now with possibilities.
“Oh! What if we make bargains the old-fashioned way?”
Skye squinted. “What?”
Zara started waving her lollipop around. “We find a soul, make a bargain, but instead of using devil magic to fulfill it, we do it ourselves and keep the magic for Remi’s bargain.”
“The bargain won’t work.”
Zara shook her head. “Not if we fulfill it ourselves. Demons make bargains with one another all the time without using devil magic. The bargain is tied to our life forces. That’s what binds them.
That’s what the cement is made up of. Humans don’t know or care if we are using devil magic or our own, as long as they get what they want. ”
“Even if we could find a human who’d give up their soul for something we’d actually be capable of fulfilling, if we tie the bargain to our life force and we can’t complete the bargain…”
Broken bargains started out as an itch but would turn into unbearable pain until the bargain was fulfilled.
“You have so many connections, Skye,” Zara said. “You don’t think you could make a real deal for someone?”
Could she?
A tingle of excitement skittered through her. She did know a lot of people in the music industry, and she was known as someone who had a psychic sense for the next big thing—mostly because she was the one to make the next big thing happen—but maybe that faith would be all she needed.
She chewed on her lip. “If the Devil finds out I’m stealing his magic, he’ll take my wings and then murder me slowly.”